


Where the tall trees bend, I asked something of you

by Darkhymns



Category: Tales of Symphonia
Genre: F/M, Fictober 2019, Fluff, Innocence, Pre-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-14
Updated: 2019-10-14
Packaged: 2020-12-14 21:49:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,123
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21022793
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Darkhymns/pseuds/Darkhymns
Summary: Colette wanted to give something to Lloyd for retrieving her lost weapon, despite him never saying it was necessary. But maybe what she asked was still much too selfish.For Fictober 2019, prompt #5: "I might just kiss you."





	Where the tall trees bend, I asked something of you

**Author's Note:**

> I missed putting this up on the date, but let's pretend I got it on time! (Am trying to write Fictober with other fandoms but I can't pass up on these two...)

The sun was setting, lighting fire to the clouds in a burst of red. Maybe the sight of it was what had gotten Colette to make her mistake. It had only been a few weeks since she had started using the chakrams, their weight deceptively heavy and their sides nearly sharp enough to bite into her palms.

Lloyd was staring up at a cliff, scratching his head. "How… did you get your chakram up _that_ far?"

The cliffs that bordered Iselia were not easy things to traverse - so much of the wilderness outside was unkempt, unruly, and so out of the order of neat and proper things that the Church taught her. It was a lot like Lloyd himself, and maybe that was why she was always drawn past the gates to sneak out into the forests with him.

Sometimes they came out here to play, but today was an attempt at training. The result was the ring of metal embedded within a brush that sprouted from the cliff, reflecting back the waning sunlight.

"Uh… I guess I messed up, huh?" She laughed, both hands now clasped around the single chakram she still held. She supposed she could start using just one, but it had not been easy for her father to help get her the weapons.. and it was nice matching double with Lloyd.

Right now, Lloyd had his hands on both hilts of his swords, craning his neck up high to see what he could do. After a moment, he sighed. "Colette, you really have one heck of a throwing arm."

"Hm, it must be all the practice from playing catch with Noishe!"

"No way! That's…. Actually that does make sense…"

Colette felt strangely a bit proud at that, but that didn't help with their situation by much. It was still quite a ways high up. They'd need wings to get up there!

"I guess I'll just have to go get it.." Lloyd said, already stretching out his arms to prepare for the climb.

"Oh! No, no, you don't need to, Lloyd. It was my fault. I should be the one to get it." Even though her legs trembled at the height. 

"We need to though! Or you'll get in trouble for hanging out with me again." She saw something cross his face, something she wasn’t used to seeing. "It was my fault anyway. I was making you show me how to use those."

She wanted to say she was so happy to show him her recent training, but he was already turning away, ready to start the climb.

"Is there anything I can do to make up for it?"

Lloyd turned back to her, his right foot already planted on a jutting rock. “Huh? Like what?” At that, she saw the curiosity in his eyes. She knew he wouldn’t pass up the opportunity that he might get a gift. That excitement fueled up her own, made her grin wide.

“If I do, it’ll help you climb faster up that cliff I bet.”

“Hey, so you_ do_ want me to go and get it!” 

She giggled, still holding onto her sole chakram. “I just want to help you!”

“Well, fine then! What you got for me?” Now back to facing her, hands on his hips, he waited for what she would give him. But first, Colette had to think of something! 

"How about...I'll bake you some cookies!" She had always wanted to make cookies regularly like Genis did.

Lloyd raised his eyebrow. "No offense, Colette… but you don’t exactly make the best cookies. I mean, not nearly as bad as the Professor...but you somehow also set the cookies on fire the last time."

Colette ducked her head in embarrassment. "Oh yeah, hehe…. I was hoping you wouldn't remember that."

“It’s kind of hard to forget something like that when it was at my house!”

Dirk had been so forgiving then, even trying out the burnt cookies she had made despite the fact she had nearly set fire to their wooden home. But since there was a metalsmithing forge in the same place, maybe fire accidents like that were common?

“I can help you study when we get back? For last night’s homework!”

Lloyd looked less excited at that. “Man, do we gotta study? Can’t you just give me the answers or something?”

“Ah, but I don’t know the answers either…” It was a lot harder to come up with fun things than she had thought. What would be fun exactly…?

“I can take over grooming Noishe’s fur for you! And help give him baths! And feed him… and take him out for walks and play catch!” 

“Colette, this is sounding like it’s more for you than for me! And I already let you help me with all those things anyway!”

“Oh right… But Noishe is so cute, I want to!”

“Heh, I know, I know…”

Lloyd was smiling, but it wasn’t the excitement that she was looking for. She thought hard on it again. She kept thinking on things that _she_ thought was fun, but not for him specifically. But couldn’t it be for both still?

The sun was setting, something that Lloyd noticed. “Hey, if we want to get back to Iselia soon, I’ll need to go get it quick… You can make it up to me some other time!

“Ah, hold on, I just… um…” It was so hard to think of something, but she caught the way the sun shone on his hair, the wind pulling at his collar strips, making her want to reach out and grab it. She nearly wanted to do so now, remembering how she had nearly fallen earlier, Lloyd’s hands grasping her around the waist to prevent her stumble. His eyes had latched onto the chakram that flew from her palm to arc into the air, his hands still holding tight. She had been sad once he finally let go.

"Well, I, um…" Something took over her voice suddenly. "I-I might just kiss you then!"

Lloyd seemed to stumble despite standing still only a moment ago.

"...Say that again?"

Colette stood still, though her mind was going into chaos. Everything felt so different to the soft sky above.

“I didn’t say anything.”

“...Huh? You just did!”

“Ah! You mean just now…”

“Yeah…?”

She could barely look at him; the sun casting brilliant shades over his skin. She had always wanted to be close to him. But there was the fear that he’d know much more than she was prepared to give. He always seemed to. And then she had just blurted it out anyway.

“I… might just kiss you,” she said again, looking to the side.

It felt so quiet, underneath the quickly darkening sky.

She didn’t hear Lloyd say anything, and that worried her. Taking a deep breath, she raised her head, expecting to find a disappointed-looking Lloyd. Instead, he… wasn’t there? Had she scared him so much that he had run off?

She looked at the cliff, up a few feet, and already found him climbing up its face than she thought was possible in so short a time.

"L-Lloyd!" she cried out in surprise.

"Hold on, hold on I'm getting it!!" He was waving back to her, his grin ecstatic. He had nearly lost his grip on one handhold, quickly catching onto another with his previously waving hand. “J-just a sec! Almost there!”

“Wait! That’s too fast!” She rushed up to the cliff, thinking of going after him. But her stockings caught onto bushes that lined the ground, her feet nearly made her slip at a sudden dip in the ground. She’d just cause more trouble for Lloyd if she went up too, it was just-

She wanted to always be with him.

Something in his movements was so strong and quick, that soon he was even jumping across little outcroppings of rock that gave him enough room to plant his feet. Her heart shuddered as he nearly slipped off one, only to catch himself at the last moment, to look back down at her on the ground and give another grin. So bright and so excited, like when he would rush to her when she would walk down the steps from the Church, or helped her ride Noishe to then run with them both down the shoreline of the nearby river. Those are the times she could forget everything else, everything she was meant to do.

Lloyd finally reached her chakram, already grabbing it in his right hand, where the white cloth around his palm stood so starkly against the red dye of his glove. “Got it!” He turned towards her again, the wind blowing strongly against his hair, his ribbons waving erratically in the air like fluttering wings. “See, Colette? I got it!!”

“Y-yeah!” She was calling back, also excited, but still so very nervous for him. “Just… be careful!”

“What? Sorry, I can’t hear you!” Lloyd was shouting loudly, but the wind kept trying to take his voice away. No way her quiet voice would reach up to him that far. “Hold on, I’m coming back down!”

And with that, Lloyd jumped.

There was so much Lloyd could do - as wild as the forests outside her stable village, holding something unknown and exciting. To others, it could be frightening, as many others saw of the boy living outside of what they’ve known. Raised by a dwarf, carrying weapons in his hands to fight off monsters on his daily trek, and his voice so loud it could reach across the village when he called out her name. 

Colette finally let go of her remaining chakram, rushing up to where Lloyd was falling. He looked ready to land, as if he had done this so much before, but she couldn’t let go of her worries, of her need to be with him. Arms extended, she attempted to catch him… which just made him land on top of her instead.

The ground was soft beneath her, and she could see the backdrop of the sky against the fringe of Lloyd’s hair.

“Gah! Colette…” Lloyd whined. She had fallen onto her back, Lloyd’s hands pressed into the grass on both sides of her head, trying not to put his full weight on her. The chakram he had held had rolled off to the side, letting go of it at the last second.

“Sorry, sorry,” Colette was repeating, her hands clinging to the material of his jacket. She smiled up at him. “But… you scared me, you know.”

Lloyd looked down at her, his hair sticking out all over the place from the force of his descent. “Ah, I was going to be okay… I do that all the time.”

“Mm, but you never told me that!”

“I didn’t?” He blinked, his confusion so endearing she just wanted to stare at him forever. “Oh… I guess I forgot to. Sorry, Colette...but I did get your chakram!”

“Hehe, yeah! Good job.” She didn’t move from her position, and neither did he. The sun, close to the edge of the sky, shone against his hair, making her blink.

Lloyd noticed the quiet, smiling a little nervously. “Ha… um, about before, you don’t… have to or anything.” She felt his body shift, getting ready to leave. “I can just take you back home.”

What her hands held wasn’t exactly his jacket she realized, but the white strips that extended from his collar. She held them in both hands, keeping him from getting up.

“Uh…” Lloyd said, noticing her stopping him. He didn’t seem to mind, she thought. Or was that just wishful thinking?

“But I wanted to give it you though.”

She would always keep his expression then close to her heart - once she left on her own journey, once she finally said her goodbyes, this was one selfish thing she would allow herself to keep. His red cheeks, the lock of hair that fell over his forehead, the surprise slowly morphing to something much more pleased.

“It seemed like you were really happy about it too,” she said, gauging to make sure. Still, she held the fabric, twirling it between her fingers.

“Yeah… I’m still really happy about it,” he said with that addictive smile.

“Well… then… um, let me,” she said, before pulling him down just a fraction so she could kiss him, closing her eyes as she did so. She still felt the warmth of the sun; on her face, against her lips, how he softly fell against her, the hint of her name on his breath.

Perhaps she was allowed one more selfish thing she could keep. Lloyd taught her that two of something was always better anyway.


End file.
